


Ode to a Monster

by NinjaSniperKitty



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: And Jaskier is an absolute poetry snob, Established Relationship, Fluff, Humor, Idiots in Love, In which Geralt is terrible at poetry, M/M, just so much fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:33:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26237950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NinjaSniperKitty/pseuds/NinjaSniperKitty
Summary: Jaskier proposes a simple challenge to Geralt: write one single verse of poetry, and he'll buy him all the beer he can drink.Geralt, despite admittedly not having a single poetic bone in his body, takes up the challenge under Jaskier's tutelage.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 9
Kudos: 80





	Ode to a Monster

Jaskier bit at the end of his quill pen. It was a habit that Jaskier engaged in quite often when he wrote, Geralt had noted much to his disgust. “What are your thoughts on this line? ‘The notches on his quiver numbered one and nineteen more.’ Does that sound pretentious? Should I just say 20?”

“I'm the last person you should be asking,” said Geralt. He attempted to peer over Jaskier’s bent knees at the book in his lap. “What are you writing? Another song?”

“Mhm.” Jaskier’s gaze never wandered from the pages in front of him. “Surely you must have some opinion on the line, Geralt.”

“No.” He never had been very good at writing prose, much less poetry. It was boring, in his opinion. An art best left to the scrivenors and bards. There were far better ways he could spend his time rather than staring at blank pages for hours. 

“Mm… Perhaps I should just go with 20, then. Better to be safe than sorry…” Like that, quill took to paper once more. 

While there was little that Geralt found less interesting than writing, he found it fascinating to watch Jaskier at work. When he wrote, Geralt could occasionally hear him hum small melodies under his breath before his pen flew across the paper like a man possessed, as if he could hear the lyrics in his head well before he wrote them down. It was one of the rare moments that Jaskier was ever quiet, too. It bought him at least two hours of precious, precious silence. 

The bard was, admittedly, good at his craft. While Geralt found no joy in his works, the townspeople seemingly couldn’t get enough of Jaskier’s bawdy ballads. 

The first song that Jaskier had written about him describing their first adventure together had taken off like wildfire. Soon after, he was hearing people in taverns slurring the lyrics (falsely) describing his encounter with a sylvan and humming the obnoxious tune. The song had at least garnered him some work and positive attention, which he was grateful for. And Geralt was happy that it garnered some positive attention for Jaskier as well. 

The bard had accompanied him on every witcher contract since then. Jaskier had initially said that he accompanied him in order to  _ seek out inspiration,  _ yet Geralt quickly discovered that he had developed feelings for him at some point. Geralt didn’t mind; although he would never admit it, he enjoyed Jaskier’s company. It was nice having a warm body to curl up next to after a long day of killing wolves and wading through basilisk guts.

Geralt watched as Jaskier smirked and chuckled to himself.  _ Of course he would laugh at his own jokes.  _ It made the corners of his own lips turn up just the slightest. He averted his gaze from the bard’s face and back towards the roaring fire, appreciating the stillness of the night.

“Geralt?”

“Hm?”

“Have you ever written poetry before? Or music?”

Geralt set him with an unimpressed look. “Do I seem like the kind of man that would have a poetic bone in their body?”

“I mean, no, but looks can be deceiving. Isn’t that what you always say? Isn’t that what you said when I tried to pet that—oh, what did you call it? A mormont? Momoa? M-something? Mmmm—”

“A mamuna. And you wouldn’t be calling it cute if you knew what they did to straggling travelers.”

“Sure.” Jaskier fixed his gaze on him. “I’m sure you would be quite good at writing poetry, though.” There was a look of sincerity behind his gray eyes.

Geralt couldn’t help but snort at that. “Yeah? And why do you think that?”

“The best poetry is written when one can draw from their own life experiences. You’ve had more exciting adventures killing monsters and bedding lusty maidens than anyone I know! That's why I decided to accompany you, after all.”

Geralt winked, a growing smirk on his face. “What, and not because of my devilishly good looks? Piss-colored eyes and the hair of an old crone?”

“You jest, but that certainly plays a part in it! You are quite handsome, Geralt. And built like a… like a brick house to top it all off.” He stretched his arms out, quill still in hand, as if to emphasize his point. “You could just… crush my head with your thighs and I would thank you for it—”

“Stop, you'll make me blush.” Geralt rolled his eyes. The bard certainly had…  _ a way  _ with words, to put it nicely. The witcher sat up from the rock to add another log to the fire. The cinders flared up into the night sky. Past the embers on the other side of the fire, Geralt could see that Jaskier was still looking at him in earnest. Observing him. He had neatly set his writing materials off to the side and had clasped his hands on top of his knees. 

He clearly wanted to say something, but Geralt was not sure if he wanted to open that can of worms yet. Once he started, it was hard to get the bard to shut up. And Geralt was quite enjoying the relative silence. With a sigh, he quirked a silver eyebrow.

“You should try your hand at writing something!”

“No.”

“C’mon, Geralt!” With that, Jaskier scooted over to join him on his rock. There was hardly enough room for the two of them, and Geralt refused to move over because  _ he knew where this was going.  _ Instead, Jaskier was left partially hanging off in what looked to be an extremely uncomfortable position. But he was undeterred. 

“I really,  _ really _ do think you would be good at it. And that's my professional opinion!” Jaskier widened his stance until his thigh brushed against Geralt's. “Nothing makes a man sound more cultured than the ability to recite the language of the gods themselves. Women? Love poetry. Believe me when I say that I know this from first hand experience. All you have to do is read a few verses, and  _ boom _ —instant swooning.”

“What about men that don’t respect the space of other people?” Geralt nudged his own stance wider to scoot Jaskier’s thigh aside.

“Ah, they especially! Men that don’t respect the space of other people?” He draped his leg over Geralt’s. “Love poetry. Believe me when I say that I know this from first hand experience. All you have to do is read a few verses, and  _ boom _ —instant swooning.”

“Hmm. I'll have to remember that.”

“I will make you a deal, Geralt. If you write one stanza for me—it doesn't even need to be a good one—I will buy you  _ so many  _ flagons of ale at the next tavern we come across.”

Geralt raised his eyebrows at that. “Where was this coin when I purchased our past four rooms?”

Jaskier flicked his hand. “Irrelevant. Stay on topic, Geralt.”

It was a tempting offer. It’d been too long since he'd had enough spare coin to feel anything when drinking. He knew that Jaskier had more coin than he would ever let on. And he  _ knew  _ that he had been making more coin recently singing in taverns with his newfound musical prestige.

“I don't do poetry. Never have been able to,” Geralt admitted. It was the truth. Despite having put a morsel of thought into Jaskier’s offer, he doubted his abilities to create even a bad poem.

“I can teach you!” Jaskier’s face lit up at that, and he looked giddy at the prospect. It was almost endearing, Geralt thought, and he wasn’t sure if he was feeling up to crushing the bard in that moment. 

_ I'm going to regret this _ , he thought to himself and buried his face in his hands. “...Fine.  _ One verse,  _ Don’t expect it to be any good. And I'm ordering top shelf drinks.”

Jaskier clasped his hands together, a teeth-baring smile spreading across his face. “Of course! Oh, how exciting is this? Geralt of Rivia, famed witcher, writing poetry! Okay, um, where to start…” His gaze drifted upward for several moments as if deep in thought before he clapped his hands together once more.

“I guess a good place to start would be to assess how much you already know. Rhythmical composition. How much do you know of it?”

“Next to nothing.”

“Rhetorical devices—alliteration, analogies, anaphoras, etcetera. Have you heard of them?”

“Heard of analogies. Never heard of rhetorical devices.”

“Oh God, we have so much work to do, Geralt…” Jaskier muttered under his breath. “Well, we can start there, then. Analogies. They are the backbone of a lot of poetry and serve as a lovely starting point for beginners. It allows the creative juices to flow, if you will, and you can easily build off of them. Now, what is an analogy, Geralt?”

Geralt sighed.  _ It was going to be a long night.  _ “An analogy compares things.”

Jaskier smiled almost comically large, and Geralt couldn’t help but feel as if he was being talked down to. As if he were a child being praised by their teacher for learning their letters. “Good! There are many different forms of an analogy. A simile, for example, is a means of comparison that often uses the words  _ like  _ or  _ as _ . Some of the most famous works by the likes of the great Visconte de Burns and Maxwell Blades, two of my personal favorite poets—”

“Who?”

“—use similes in their works. I, too, have been known to use them from time to time. For example,” Jaskier cleared his throat and paused for a moment, his eyes glued to Geralt once more. Their gazes met, and the bard nodded. “Geralt, your eyes are like the first rays of sunshine after a bitter frost. Just as the sun warms the earth in the early morn’, your smile illuminates my soul.”

Geralt couldn’t help but roll his eyes. “That was hackneyed as hell.

“Oh, absolutely. My work is at its best when I am given the opportunity to write it down first. But it works for this example.” Jaskier nodded towards him. “Your turn!”

_ Shit.  _ Geralt cleared his throat, stalling for time. His mind was blank. The concept was easy enough, sure, but to actually come up with one… It was entirely different. It shouldn’t be hard, yet here he was... Words. Words refused to come to him at that moment. He opened and closed his mouth several times, but nothing coherent came out. 

He just had to compare two things. Simple. Throw a ‘like’ in there.

But why was it so goddamn hard?!

“About what? What should it be about?” His eyes sought Jaskier’s eyes in desperation.

“Anything you like! My eyes. The curves of a woman. The color of a rose. Your monster of choice.”

Monsters. He could do monsters. He’d spent enough time around them to easily be able to picture one in his mind.

A monster. Any monster.

A nekker.

Ugly, putrid-smelling things that constantly had that look of being half-starved. Geralt imagined their beady eyes and their pale skin. He pictured them burrowing underground, only to catch their prey off-guard by attacking en masse. They reeked of damp earth and rot.

Their smell… They smelled like…

Damp earth and rot. 

That wasn’t rhetorical at all! That was what they actually smelled like!

Geralt exhaled loudly through his nose. He could feel the muscles in his shoulders tensing. “Tried. Can’t do it.”

“Oh, come on, Geralt! I know you can!” In an attempt at being reassuring, Jaskier squeezed his shoulder. “What was it you said to me all those years ago? My singing is like ordering a pie and finding it has no filling? _That_ , albeit extraordinarily rude, is a fantastic example of a simile.”

“Damn it, Jaskier, I can’t think of them on the spot!“

“It simply takes practice. As with anything, it becomes much easier the more you do it. Did you decide on a topic?”

He hated this. He wished Jaskier would just forget about the whole thing and that he could go back to meditating. “Nekkers.”

Jaskier tilted his head. “Remind me, which one is that?”

“The ugly ones.” Geralt smirked.

“Wow,  _ thank you  _ for describing almost every beast we’ve ever encountered. Incredible. Remarkable, truly.” He scoffed and rolled his eyes. “You know what? Let’s go with that: ugliness. Now, what is something else that is truly revolting to look at?”

Geralt attempted to think. He’d encountered a lot of gruesome things in his time. A lot of monsters. A lot of people. Human nature tended to be the ugliest, but he was certain that that was not what Jaskier was pulling for. Of the monsters he’d slain, kikimores, with their dark chitinous shells and gaping maws filled with red needle-like teeth, were certainly up there as far as repulsive sights went.  _ Yeah, that could work. _

“A kikimore.”

“A kiki-what-now?” Jaskier narrowed his eyes. “Is that another beast? Geralt, one of the beautiful things about poetry is that it speaks to the human soul—a universal language, if you will—that transcends all experience. No one outside of  _ you _ would know what that is. I don’t even know what that is! A-And you can’t just compare one monster to another monster!” He sighed. It was becoming obvious that Jaskier was getting frustrated with him.  _ Good.  _ “Try again, but with something less monster-y this time.”

_ Less monster-y.  _ He would show him  _ less monster-y _ when he shoved his… __ Geralt pinched at the bridge of his nose. He had to think again. The mental image of a nekkar filled his mind once more, their pointed ears and sharp claws. Loose skin around their necks to protect their vulnerable throats from the bites of bigger, badder monsters. Their necks looked somewhat like a—

“Horse scrotum!” Geralt blurted out, his voice much louder than he had intended. “Nekkars are as ugly as a horse’s scrotum!”

Jaskier’s eyes went wide, his eyebrows shooting up to his hairline. The corners of his mouth twitched, until he let out the ugliest snorting laughter Geralt had ever heard from the man. The bard placed a hand on his shoulder and doubled over into his lap, his shoulders heaving with each laugh. Even though it had been an honest attempt, the ghost of a smile creeps over Geralt’s face. It gave him a small piece of joy to know that at least his attempts at this could make even his bard laugh—intentional or not. 

It took several moments before Jaskier could compose himself enough to speak. “Oh my God, Geralt, I love it.” He wiped at the corner of one eye with the sleeve of his blue doublet. “And I love the enthusiasm even more. Hoo… Well done.” Jaskier cleared his throat in an attempt to appear serious once more. “Yes, ‘Nekkars are as ugly as a horse’s scrotum,’ “ he held back another snort, “is a, ah, lovely example of a simile. Now, if I may revise a little bit for the sake of structure, let us go with,

_ “A nekkar is a grisly thing _

_ Like the testes of a horse. _

“How does that sound so far?”

_ So far.  _ Geralt didn’t like the implication that this was not the end of his little challenge. “It sounds ridiculous.”

“And that is perfectly acceptable! Levity in poetry is just as necessary as those that speak to the heart. We just need a few more lines and I think you will have yourself a lovely poem, my friend. Now, let us talk form. While some circles will claim that free verse poetry is a perfectly acceptable form, I think that it is, to put it bluntly, trite and without tact, and I will die on this hill. But that is besides the point.” Jaskier clapped his hands together once more. “Rhyming! My favorite part of the creative process. Yes, we must come up with a rhyme scheme for your poem! I feel a simple four-line rhyme would behoove this one.”

_ What happened to teaching him?  _ Geralt thought with a snort.  _ He’s practically writing this himself.  _ Not that Geralt would complain; the sooner he could be done with this, the better. And it looked as if Jaskier was having the time of his life taking the lead, so Geralt let him carry on.

“What?” The bard’s smile faded. “You look vexed. Do you have a question, Geralt?”

“It’s nothing.”

“Ah. Well, do not hesitate to stop me if I am going too fast.”

_ Sure. _

Jaskier continued, “With this rhyme scheme, we must think of something that rhymes with  _ horse.  _ Thankfully, it is a fairly easy word to rhyme with. Throw some rhyming words at me, Geralt.”

Rhyming. He could do rhyming. Children could do rhyming. “Coarse. Gorse. Uh… Remorse—”

Jaskier snapped his fingers. “Stop right there, you’ve found gold.  _ Remorse.  _ I like that. It fits the theme of monsters perfectly. Marvelous.” His grip tightened on Geralt’s shoulder, the other hand splayed out before him. His enthusiasm was a little too much, and Geralt had to resist the urge to scoot away lest he get elbowed in the bard’s excitement. “We’re so close, Geralt. Can you taste it? Okay, we just need two more verses. You’ve got your subject. You’ve got your rhyming word. Now, tie them together and make some poetic magic happen! I want to be  _ swooning  _ by the time this is done!”

Geralt swallowed the lump in his throat. It had taken him far too long just to come up with a damn analogy, and even that had to be altered! Now he was expected to just  _ finish  _ the thing under such constraints? Ridiculous. 

His yellow eyes glanced around their shoddy campsite and back to Jaskier’s face, as if the answers were somehow going to be written there. There were, in fact, no words written on his face, but the bard did give him another attempt at an encouraging smile. It didn’t lessen his urge to punch him in the face at that moment for even suggesting he do this. Geralt closed his eyes to think.

_ Think. _

He inhaled sharply and looked back to Jaskier. 

_ “They’ll eat you _

_ With no remorse.” _

Jaskier raised his brows as if waiting for more. When Geralt did not follow up and instead stared at him with a listless look, his mouth pressed into a hard line. “Oh. You’re done.” His tone was flat. His gaze drifted back towards the campfire. Under his breath, Geralt heard him murmur, “The rhythm is all off…” After a few moments of staring wordlessly into the flame, Jaskier jolted back up and pulled his hand away from Geralt’s shoulder. “If I may revise—just a little more…” 

Although he would never admit it, something sunk in his stomach at his words. Just a little bit. That hadn’t quite been the reaction he had been hoping for. He liked it when Jaskier smiled for him, not whatever…  _ this  _ expression was. He had thought what he came up with was half decent. Not enough to make anyone swoon, per se, but not terrible. It was something, at least.

Upon noticing the corners of Geralt’s mouth turn down, Jaskier was quick to change his tune. He beamed at him once more, but Geralt knew it was only half genuine. The hand returned to his shoulder. “No, it’s  _ lovely  _ Geralt. Really! We’ll use it just the way it is.” Jaskier cleared his throat. He projected in a clear voice,

“ _ A nekkar is a grisly thing _

_ Like the testes of a horse. _

_ They’ll eat you _

_ With no remorse. _

“A poem by Geralt of Rivia, the White Wolf!” Jaskier pressed the back of his hand to his forehead and pretended to collapse on top of the witcher, his eyes rolling back into his head. “What an absolute  _ spectacle  _ of a man! You’re telling me that he can slay monsters  _ and  _ create poetry?! What  _ can’t  _ he do? Oh, be still my beating heart! My penis is rock—”

“Get off of me, you pompous ass.” But there was no malice behind Geralt’s words. He pushed at Jaskier’s shoulder, yet a small smile played at his lips. Rather than getting off, however, Jaskier layed out until his head rested on the witcher's lap. Geralt couldn’t help but admire the way the flickering of the fire highlighted the bard’s handsome features. He let him stay there.

Jaskier spoke up once more. “Now, for the next verse—”

_ That  _ got Geralt’s attention. “I may not know much about poetry, but I know what a damn stanza is. And you got your  _ one,”  _ he poked Jaskier on the forehead for emphasis, “stanza from me. As agreed upon.”

Jaskier blinked up at him. ”But weren’t we having a good time?”

“ _ You  _ were having a good time. I was floundering like a,” he gestured in the air, searching for a proper comparison, “flounder. I don’t know.”

Jaskier chuckled at that. “I thought you said that you were good with analogies when not under pressure.”

“I never said that I was good with analogies. I just said I could come up with them on the occasion.”

Jaskier flicked his hand. “I still believe that you are far more clever than you give yourself credit for. Ooh!” His face lit up. “You know what your poem needs? To be performed! Let me go retrieve my lute and—”

Geralt placed a thick arm across Jaskier’s chest to keep him from getting up. The absolute last thing he wanted was for someone to actually sing the abomination he had created. It was for Jaskier’s ears only, and he wouldn’t risk the possibility that someone else would hear it. “I hope you’re ready to shill out some coin, Jaskier, because I plan on drinking that tavern dry when we get there.”

**Author's Note:**

> I, too, am absolutely terrible at writing poetry


End file.
